3DCart Lets Online Sellers Offer Groupon-Style Deals

Online sellers of any size will be able to run their own Groupon-like group sales and daily deals beginning this week when 3DCart unveils the latest version of its shopping cart and ecommerce software.

The company 3Dcart makes Version 4 of its software available July 4. The new features are included with all of the company's hosting packages, which begin at $19.95 per month. Since 3DCart provides software as a service, existing customers don't need to do anything special to obtain the software. Interest is running high, though, and those customers may need to wait.

"It'll be about 2 weeks to get all 12,000 merchants upgraded but new customers should receive it right away," commented Jimmy Rodriguez, Chief Technical Officer with 3DCart. He added that some companies that already operate their own Web sites and online stores are signing up with 3DCart specifically for the Group Sales and Daily Deals features. "We weren't expecting getting that type of customer," admits Rodriguez.

Version 4's new features include:

- Daily Deals. Online stores can feature a different deal every day on their sites. Such sales are intended to help improve conversions through urgency and exclusivity

- Group Deals. Sellers can offer a deal that is only effective if a specified number of consumers chooses it in a specified period of time. Sellers will be able to specify how many customers constitute a "group," what the deal is, and how to promote it.

- Make An Offer.This feature allows customers to bid on specified items.

- Autoresponders. These are pre-programmed emails that are sent out at regular intervals after a purchase is made to inform a customer an item has shipped, to inquire about the receipt, with the goal of building brand loyalty.

- Feedback. Customers are able to easily send feedback comments to the merchant using feedback tabs.

- Facebook Send Button. This allows customers to quickly share products with Facebook friends.

One 3DCart, merchant, Discount Watch Store is already using the Daily Deals feature on a test basis. At this writing, the deal of the day was a Seiko watch reduced from $300 to $89. A time counter showed 9 hours remaining on the deal.

In addition, 3Dcart has integration and a partnership with Groupon and LivingSocial so that any merchant that runs a deal through those daily deal sites can easily generate the 3,000 to 5,000 certificate codes needed on their store for shoppers to claim the Groupon/LivingSocial deal. "Many online stores cannot support that many codes," Rodriguez said, "and in occasions even when they do it, they require the merchants to manually input the codes one by one."

He says all of the features are intended to increase conversion rates for merchants. Many tie in to one of the current buzzwords in ecommerce. "You could call it social commerce selling," he says. "They're all new ways to sell."

About the Author
Greg Holden** is AuctionBytes Contributing Editor. He is a journalist and the author of many books, including "Starting an Online Business For Dummies," "Go Google: 20 Ways to Reach More Customers and Build Revenue with Google Business Tools," and several books about eBay, including "How to Do Everything with Your eBay Business," second edition, and "Secrets of the eBay Millionaires," both published by Osborne-McGraw Hill. Find out more on Greg's website GregHolden.com), which includes his blog, a list of his books, and his fiction and biographical writing.